


Deserve

by PersonifiedKat



Series: Experiments and Throat Punches [1]
Category: The Last Kids on Earth (Cartoon)
Genre: Angst, Character Study, M/M, My First Work in This Fandom, Swearing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-14
Updated: 2020-09-14
Packaged: 2021-03-07 02:54:13
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,122
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26465980
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/PersonifiedKat/pseuds/PersonifiedKat
Summary: You’d be surprised how much free time one has during the apocalypse.And what does too much time lead to?Contemplation.
Relationships: Quint Baker/Dirk Savage
Series: Experiments and Throat Punches [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1923973
Kudos: 48





	Deserve

**Author's Note:**

> So this is my first story for this fandom, and it was inspired purely by the fact that both me and my sister found the TV series and immediately started shipping Dirk and Quint, only to be disappointed by the fact that the fandom as a whole is not very developed yet.  
> So here I am... developing it.  
> Kind of.  
> Anyway, I'm hoping to make this first story part of a series of one-shots, all focusing on Dirk, Quint and their relationship. This first one is set a few months into the apocalypse.  
> I have not yet read the books, so I don't know what is in store for the characters canonically outside of the TV series, so some of my content may eventually become AU or at least canon-divergent. 
> 
> Obviously, if you don't like m/m or this particular ship, feel free to move along.  
> Otherwise please enjoy.

You’d think living in the end times would be a lot more stressful. You’d think there’d be no time to waste. No end to the running, the screaming, the chasing down of necessities from crumbling buildings.

Yeah… you’d _think_ that.

The apocalypse has proven very different than Dirk could ever have expected.

Sure, the running and screaming thing happened on a somewhat regular basis. How could it not? One minute, you’re driving down Main Street in a tricked-out monster truck with your fellow survivors, humming old show-tunes and comparing bad dad-jokes. The next, your path is being blocked by the biggest, baddest, weirdest looking giant red slug thing you’ve ever seen (not that you’ve really seen a ton of those… but the point still stands). Obviously, some screaming and running might be appropriate in such a scenario… and many others, honestly. Like… fuck man, it’s the end of the world.

And, okay, a fair amount of time also _tended_ to be dedicated to the procuring of “necessities”. Survival doesn’t come for free, ya know? You’ve gotta put some elbow grease into that shit… which means hunting down some fuckin’ elbow grease.

But, even with all that, there was still an amazing amount of free time available. The question then becomes… what do you do with it?

Obviously, each of the four kids left on earth would have a different answer. Jack, for example, is way too excitable to spend any amount of time in one place. The dingus would probably always rather spend his extra, none life-threatening moments looking for… well… more threats to his life. At this point, Dirk was pretty sure the guy found almost dying enjoyable. Then there was June, who tended to be more practical with her spare time. Maybe too practical. Dirk was pretty sure all she ever did outside of their time spent as a group was sharpen her spear (she’s… freakishly obsessed with that thing). As for himself, Dirk had always had some pretty diverse interests. He liked gardening, which was lucky since it was incredibly useful in their current situation, with store reserves dwindling or expiring beyond usefulness (“No, Jack. You can’t eat black cheese”). He also loved cooking, which, again, was very useful. Other than those things, he was happy to waste time with reading old comics books, gaming, or nearly anything else. He wasn’t picky. There wasn’t really room for being picky in his upbringing…

But that’s a story for another day.

After all of them, all that’s left was Quint and…

Oh boy. Where does one even start with Quint.

When left to his own devices, he could nearly always be seen wearing one of his many pristine white lab coats, observing experiments, noting hypotheses or highlighting entire passages in textbooks (collected and often carried by Dirk himself… what? The kid has noodle arms. So what if he lends him a hand once in a while? Is that a crime?). Most of said textbooks were far beyond what you’d expect a middle-schooler to be able to _read_ , let alone comprehend (and even correct. There had been several occasions where they had come across older books that Quint would spend hours reading through and scoffing at. Apparently science could go out-of-date…who knew?). Honestly… The kid was a genius. With all the batteries he’d been able to rig together, all the old equipment he could repair and install, all the gadgets he could come up with… Dirk honestly doesn’t know where they’d be without Quint.

But… as mentioned above… you’d be surprised how much free time one has during the apocalypse.

And what does too much time lead to?

Contemplation.

Dirk would never have considered himself to be particularly contemplative, but he wasn’t brain-dead either. He had thought-spirals like anyone else. One minute he might be wondering why the monster they’d fought that day was purple, the next he’s questioning all the choices he’s ever made. You know, the regular “can’t sleep” kind of thought-spirals.

The weirdest thing though, was that a lot of Dirks thought-spirals lately had centred around one thing. Well, one person.

And that person was Quint.

He thought about how the kid was so small. Well, maybe for the average middle-schooler he was normal-sized, but compared to Dirk he was tiny. It was a thought he’d had before, back when things were normal, and he used to find it amusing. Now that there were far greater dangers than him around though… not so funny. In fact, very _not-funny_. But the kid was smart. He’d proven time and time again that he was more than clever enough to defend himself. That didn’t stop Dirk from… feeling things when he was in trouble, though. Bad feelings, those were. He didn’t like them.

Ultimately, thinking about Quint’s size (or lack thereof) usually just reminded Dirk how young he was. Well, how young they all were, really, but… when he thought about Quint…

It really bugged him, for some reason. Thinking about how young Quint was. How much life he’d had yet to live when things all went side-ways. What his future used to look like. He would’ve graduated middle school top of his class. Then high school after. Then he would’ve gone to Harvard, or Yale, or some other crazy smart kid school where his professors would have worshipped the ground he walked on (if they knew what was good for them). After that, the world would have been Quint’s fuckin’ oyster. Dirk literally couldn’t think of anything the nerd couldn’t have done. It was the complete opposite of any future that might have been in store for Dirk himself… and this is where Dirk would literally force himself to stop thinking.

But now… well.

None of that would ever happen.

Even if they found a way to reverse the apocalyptic process, return the monsters to their dimension and get rid of the zombies… what then? They had no idea if there were any other survivors left, or if they truly were the last kids on earth. Even if there were others, it would take years to rebuild society as they once knew it.

That old future Dirk had imagined for Quint was as good as a pipe dream now.

And for some reason, that really hurt to think about.

Sure, they were okay and they would _be_ okay. Quint was always going to be the smartest guy Dirk had ever known. He was always going to be their team’s backup, and he was always going to give Dirk weird feelings that he didn’t want to analyze just yet… But, Dirk would always know that he deserved better. And Dirk wished like hell that he could give that ‘better’ to him.


End file.
